The Problems of Protestantism, II: Rebuttals

My previous post on this issue got a decent amount of feedback, both in the comments and elsewhere. Here is my promised rebuttal to those thoughtful comments, and while I want to address them in particular, I’d like to first take a moment to re-articulate the core of my previous article, before tackling the particular responses.

The reason for this approach is that the majority of feedback I received (certain persons notwithstanding) was largely off-topic from the central issue or addressed what were only peripheral concerns.

What I called the “central issue” of the last article was the idea of sola scriptura. Some people took issue with my definition, so I will expand it.

What I mean by sola scriptura can be boiled down to something like this:

The supremacy of the Bible over and/or against tradition (or any other means) as the primary authority, starting place, or standard for Christian life, morals, beliefs, etc.

As a matter of note, saying something like, “GOD is the primary authority, starting place, etc.,” doesn’t say or add anything to the discussion if reading and using the Bible is your primary way of communicating with/interacting with God. We’d still be talking about the same thing.

Fixing our definition of sola scriptura makes the arguments presented last time stronger and more to the point and makes for a wider target. Now, if sola scriptura is the “central issue,” the underlying issue is the issue of authority. This is the real center of the problem, which I will summarize like this:

There are certain things that are of central importance to the Christian: how we are saved, what is the church, are the sacraments real, how should we specifically live our lives, what it means to be a Christian, etc. These are very important issues. However, the Bible isn’t written as a rulebook or an instruction manual, and because the Bible isn’t crystal clear about these very important things, and because, moreover, no text can interpret itself, the text must be interpreted. If the Bible is the only show in town (because you believe in some version of sola scriptura), then the Christian who takes the Bible in this way is in for a bumpy ride: endless argument and discussion about interpretation leads us to the question of authority: who is the authority on interpretation? And then we’re at a standstill, since the question is actually impossible to answer in the realm of Protestantism. This leads to all the problems we detailed in the previous article.

The critique may be made even shorter by saying this:
At the end of the day, you and the Bible means YOU, because the Bible has got to be interpreted.

Put another way,

Sola scriptura means solus ego.

That is the central problem with Protestantism, and is the cause of all the splits and other consequences we discussed.

Now, our previous responses boiled down into four major categories:

1. The differences between denominations really aren’t that big.

2. Protestantism isn’t perfect, but this is okay (because nothing is perfect and/or we can make it better).

3. Different approaches (other than Protestantism) have their flaws too.

4. The Holy Spirit can do it!

I’ll address these four concerns in turn.

1. The differences between denominations really aren’t that big.

John McCormick writes,

“…there are some divisions within Protestantism, and to be honest the division between the orthodox and Catholics, that are derived more from cultural differences than differences in our understanding of the Bible or our faith in Jesus as the risen lord.”

Yes of course there are cultural divisions all the time, but we’re not talking about cultural divisions, we’re talking about theology. A friend of mine once pointed out that even the time-honored John 3:16 can (and is) read in radically different ways by different Protestant sects. Calvinists (who believe in determinism) would take the word “world” to mean something like “only the elect in Christ.” Arians (followers of Arius) would take “only-begotten” to mean “created.” Arminians would take “whosoever should be belief in him shall not perish” and add “unless he falls away and loses his salvation.” Certain assent-only Christians (some Baptists or Lutherans) would take “believe in him” to mean intellectual assent, devoid and unrelated to works. The list goes on and on, and they go on and on about things that are utterly central to the faith, vital knowledge to our existence as Christians, and necessary questions that need clear, distinct answers if we are to live fully Christian lives.

James Chasteen writes,

“That is to say, divergent thought is possible while still maintaining saving faith within the individual and theological hegemony within the collective.”

Now, this can be true, but to a degree. Discussion about what order to do Sunday worship, what songs to sing, and any of the peripherals may seem to be fairly inconsequential to most, but that’s not what we’re talking about, as we pointed out. Someone who thinks that God sends people to hell and someone who thinks that heaven and hell are open to any who chose them do not have the same cosmology, do not have the same understanding of salvation, and probably don’t believe in the same sort of God. Lumping a massively large group of people with all manner of radically divergent ideas together because they all read the same text (albeit differently) and then calling them the same thing is a very confusing move, and hard to justify. For a more clear-cut example, Mormons, “Christians,” Muslims, and Jews all affirm the importance of the Old Testament. Are they similar, therefore, in distinct and important ways? Why, yes they are. Are they the same thing? Not even close. Obviously Protestant groups aren’t as radically divergent as the above examples, but when one examines the profound differences in their theology about fundamental, core issues, it becomes very difficult to call them all the same thing.

2. Protestantism isn’t perfect, but nothing is, but that’s okay, and/or it can get better.

John McCormick describes this as an inability to “enforce a consistent hermeneutic,” calls the inability in “developing a coherent system of thought” a “difficulty,” and invites us to developing a “coherent philosophical system” in Protestantism.

The problem with this sort of language is that the problem with Protestantism (the underlying issue of individual authority) can’t be solved by some further movement, some additional voice in the braying multitudes. There are tens of thousands of separate, distinct Protestant denominations, some with more organization, some with none, and any voice that tries to transcend Protestantism in order to rally Protestantism will not be able do that by the nature of the thing. You think that hasn’t been tried before? It’s been tried thousands of times, literally. Attempting it again will only add +1 to that huge 20,000-30,000 number we talked about. That’s all. This is due to no other reason that the issue of authority.

John McCormick writes,

“Why we have lost the public sphere I believe is related to our inability to understand how to engage in the public sphere without the use of force. There are good Protestant and Evangelical thinkers. They are just really bad at communicating to the masses of protestants.”

I’m not sure how that claim can be made, for it’s quite the opposite of the situation! We have some utterly FANTASTIC speakers and communicators in Protestantism, and some singularly brilliant men to boot (William Lane Craig and Alvin Plantinga, to name two). The issue isn’t with the speakers by a longshot. The issue is that each individual Protestant can (and does) hear a fantastically communicated message from a brilliant theologian and then immediately begins thinking to himself whether or not, or to what extent, he agrees with it! The reason this happens is because there is no sense of obedience to authority (and no sense of authority to be obedient to) within Protestantism. Another way of putting this is to say that the true doctrine, if it is true, must be administered to the people and the people must conform to that true doctrine. But here again is the issue of authority: not only is this not really done (as the individual Protestant must decide if he agrees or not) but it actually isn’t possible: if I’m a Protestant, and the leaders of Protestantism all say contradictory things, how am I to choose who to conform to? How do you even begin answering this question, except by beginning a process of “figuring it out for myself”? And then we’re back to where we started: individualized authority. Not only does every Protestant tend to be his own Pope, he has to be!

3. Other solutions to this problem (from Catholics and the Orthodox) have problems of their own (with the hidden assumption that this invalidates their solution).

I’m not going to address the numerous referrals to Orthodoxy and Catholicism which I received on the previous article because they are off topic. As I said before, it is “vitally important to focus on the problems presented, and shouting bravely that Catholicism (or Orthodoxy) is no alternative will not provide us with a solution to these problems.”

4. The Holy Spirit can solve these problems.

The excellent dissection of this problem done by Jon Bryan may be examined further and in more detail in a later article, but the holes with the solution(s) presented are simple:

Who says that this is the way we should do things and why should we believe his authority? The Bible certainly doesn’t explain how this works in any specific way. Though, in fact, the passages in Acts about Pentecost seem to lean, if they lean anywhere, to a specific group of humans and a specific institution having a special interpretive relationship with the Spirit who is to “guide” them into “all truth” (I’ve never had a tongue of fire on my head, have you?) though that’s not really part of our discussion yet, just food for thought.

No one’s denying that the Holy Spirit giving special insight can’t or doesn’t or won’t happen, only that it doesn’t seem to be the normative (as in “normal”) way things happen; it always shows up as some special exception to the norm. Further, we need something normative to guide us into the truth about these things, and we need to know with definitiveness what that thing is and how it works (see 1).

The fact that people disagree about doctrine with such variety IS in fact an argument against the Holy Spirit working in this particular way. For your description of how this might work provides a compelling possibility, but doesn’t really seem to match up with the world we encounter. If the Holy Spirit were helping us in this way and guiding each individual person, we would expect to be living in a particular world. Let us imagine a world where there exists a hyper-active Holy Spirit (HAHS?) that behaves this way. In this possible world, we’d find a loosely organized (if at all) group of Christians carrying their Bibles around and praying all the time and ending up mystically on the same page as everyone else who did the same, all more or less as one group. In this world it would be the “traditionalists” endlessly splitting and fighting and fragmenting over man-made doctrines. We can surely conceive of this, however, when we look at our world, we don’t see this, instead we see Quite the Contrary: What we see instead are the Bible-only, HAHS-believing, and tradition-hating people endlessly splitting and fighting and fragmenting. Meanwhile, it is the “traditionalists” who have stayed unified in three very old groups (Catholic, Orthodox, and Oriental Orthodox). Each of these three groups is massively older and more similar with one another than with the group of fragmentors and are yearly growing closer in unity rather than further apart (Eastern Orthodox and Oriental Orthodox are actively working toward reunification, and there is constant cooperation and respect between Catholics and the Orthodox and moves toward unity and mutual acknowledgement).

That’s all for now, folks. Hopefully that was helpful. We are still waiting on an answer to the central question of Authority. Who says? Why should we listen to them? Why I can’t I do it myself? I Protest!

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5 Responses

Regarding your [4.2], I just wanted to point out that there is a special name for the belief that the normative source of doctrine is the special charismatic leading of the Holy Spirit: it’s called Montanism, and it was decried as a heresy since its beginning in the 2nd century. In particular, the _heretical_ part of Montanism was not that it affirmed the charismatic or prophetic movement of the Holy Spirit in particular cases: orthodox doctrine affirms the same. It was the preference of charism and prophecy over dogma and tradition; over the church.

A heretic, Thomistically defined as one who claims to be a part of the Church while corrupting its dogmas, thrives on the heresy of Montanism because it is much more difficult to dispute the finer points of doctrine with a “charismatic”…thus fostering error. It is easy to point out and condemn, say, an Albigensian heretic: he claims that marriage is a sin, and the Church universally rebuts this false belief. It is much more difficult, however, to condemn a false prophet or a “miracle-working” charlatan (like those you see on TV nowadays).

When Protestants interpreting the Bible claim to have special revelation or “charism” from the Holy Spirit backing up their interpretation, they are in danger of false prophecy, which Christ Himself predicts and warns against in Matthew 24:24 and Mark 13:22.

By the way, Romans 16:17-18 provides an excellent method for avoiding “those who cause divisions.” St. Paul says, “avoid those who teach contrary to the tradition that has been handed down to you.” It’s that simple.

Firstly you misrepresent sola scriptura as some kind of relativistic ethereal entity that is unreliable for good doctrine. If this were the case, it is hard to understand how these letters were used by the 1st century church as authoritative and corrective doctrinal teachings in the first place over oftentimes longstanding tradition.

You also misrepresent sola scriptura to mean scripture is “all you need to understand the life of the church, salvation, sin, and how to live one’s life”. On the contrary, protestants who know that everyone has tradition understand that sola scriptura does not deny other authorities role in doctrine in any sense. The idea is even simpler than that. The intent behind this rallying/divisive doctrine is to correct and hold developing traditions and latter writings/councils accountable to the writings of Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, Peter, James, Jude and Paul. The authorial intent of these saints’ writings ought to correct other authorities. These men saw the risen christ, these men claimed to witness the extraordinary events of christ’s life and resurrection. They claimed God given authority over the way converts lived their lives in light of the person and work of Christ. We all are trying to submit to authority, we digress on what that authority is saying.

Obviously I don’t have to talk about how trusting given tradition over the older and greater authorities got the west into trouble in the first place. So your assertion that we believe scripture is everything you need isn’t accurate, but you are correct in saying that the doctrine teaches these writings should be our starting place. The west minster confession says :

VII. All things in Scripture are not alike plain in themselves, nor alike clear unto all; yet those things which are necessary to be known, believed, and observed, for salvation, are so clearly propounded and opened in some place of Scripture or other, that not only the learned, but the unlearned, in a due use of the ordinary means, may attain unto a sufficient understanding of them.

That is to say, it isn’t the only authority, but in terms of salvation it is reliable and sufficient.

Ah but this isnt your problem is it? The problem is any old joe with a laptop computer can print up a theology certificate and start baptizing people, and teaching whatever he wants in the name of sola scriptura. This is a problem, but the argument that you state in the original The Problem with Protestantism post (correct me if I’m wrong) doesnt follow.

1. A lot of Christians disagree about the authorial intent behind the writings of Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, Peter, James,Jude and Paul.

2. By Attempting to learn the authorial intent behind the writings of Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, Peter, James,Jude and Paul many churches have become obviously wrong about many things

Conclusion: We shouldn’t start by attempting to learn the authorial intent behind the writings of Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, Peter, James,Jude and Paul

The argument doesn’t follow because sola scriptura isnt saying everyone or even most will come to the same exact theology, only that these writings in particular are reliable and sufficient unto salvation. The bible isnt necessary for uniform theology, it is a reliable starting place to receive sufficient understanding of obtaining salvation.

Problem I: Protestantism has no reliable method of interpreting scripture.

The real problem here is that your measure of reliability is predicated on uniformity, as though uniformity is some kind of litmus test for the veracity of every single theological claim made by every single protestant group.

That is to say, your claim is too big, too much of a stereotype, and thus easily brought down. To say that Protestantism has NO reliable method for interpreting scripture, is to say that no denomination has a reliable method. I know you have not studied the theology, or interpretative methods of every protestant group (Who can?). So how do you know that no protestant group has a reliable method for interpreting the authorial intent of these ancient writings? You attack your loosely and unfairly characterized idea of sola scriptura against presupposed notions Uniform-superiority, then assert that Protestantism has NO reliable method. This again, is a non sequitur.

Problem II: Protestantism has no way to declare the scriptures authoritative

2 Peter 3:16 calls the writings of paul both authoritative and specifically on the same tier as the Septuagint

By the 4th century, the New testament cannon was widely accepted both in the east and west. in “Factors leading to the Selection and Closure of the New Testament Canon” Ferguson iterates that the church was not creating anything novel, but merely reasserting what was widely considered cannon, ratifying what was already the “mind of the Church”.

I can merely say that I declare the scriptures authoritative because I am in accord with what how the 4th century church chose which documents would be canonized by consensus. That is to say, I do not need to fall into one of your 4 categories, I can say that I agree with the reasons given by the early church for their authority, namely apostolic origin, liturgical use, consistency with other apostolic writings, and their universal acceptance among the early church.

Yes, This is true and Christians everywhere should repent and seek unified, correct doctrine.

Psalm 133:1 Behold, how good and pleasant it is when brothers dwell in unity!

I am willing to discuss how to best do this. I do not believe enough ecumenical work is being done between believers.

Problem IV: Protestantism cannot tell us how to live our lives.

Again, a broad claim that requires an extraordinary proof. This claim being too large is easily brought down. Can you provide proofs that all the theological claims of every protestant group fall short in telling us how to live our lives? That is what is necessary to conclude that protestantism cannot tell us how to live our lives. You attempt to get to this conclusion by saying that scripture isnt explicit about every theological issue, but i am hard pressed to find any protestant who claims it is sufficient for every aspect of theology. If a theological claim can be deduced from the authorial intent of scripture, it is still within the realm of sola scriptura, and not outside of it.

Zac, I appreciate your ability to boil things down to a few paragraphs. This is not so easy for me, unfortunately, so you’ll have to read a big long thing,

Defined loosely HSR = (1) Joe Protestant can have confidence that the Holy Spirit will help him to bring about belief in right Christian doctrine through his reading of the Scriptures prayerfully, his paying attention to what his brothers and sisters in Christ have said and say, and his use of reason to the best of his ability. And (2) the above provides Joe Protestant with a reliable method for interpreting Scripture towards right Christian Doctrine)

As you imply, I haven’t offered any positive arguments for HSR, instead I’ve merely offered a possible version of “The Holy Spirit saves the day” view which avoids the arguments you launched against it in your article,.You seem to agree that HSR does avoid some of these arguments, (or, at least, you don’t defend all of them against my rebuttal) but say that we have no reason to believe HSR, since Jon Bryan has no authority on this matter (where’s a Pope hat when you need it?). Furthermore, the problem of too many differing opinions does in fact count against HSR, you say, since we would expect to see more unity than we do in fact see if HSR were true.

As for the argument from the multiplicity of opinion on important Christian doctrines. I don’t think what you say applies to my version of HSR. The possible world you imagine has Bible Thumpers reading their Bibles individually with no help from Strong’s Concordance, their wise ol’ Dad, or from Saint Yoda (in the possible world you imagine, there is a Saint Yoda, whom nobody reads). This world does not include HSR, since HSR does not mean that Joe Protestant reads and interprets the Bible by himself, relying only on some mystical interaction with the Holy Spirit. Also, if in this possible world the Holy Spirit works with (rather than forces himself on) an imperfect people, I don’t agree that we would see the amount of unity you imagine. It seems to me that the actual world we happen to be in is consistent with HSR. As I implied somewhere in my original comment, the Holy Spirit doesn’t force right belief on anyone, but works with what he’s got (us). HSR doesn’t say how the Holy Spirit does what he does, but it does say that it involves us, and we’re not perfect.

As for my lack of authority, I could bring up the fact that I’ve won SIX (that’s right, SIX) clubber of the year awards at Awana, but I won’t. because I don’t want to embarrass you. Instead, I will try to offer an argument to accept HSR. To begin, I think you might actually agree with something like the first part (1) of HSR. It’s perfectly consistent with Orthodoxy, as far as I can tell. If it is consistent with Orthodoxy to believe (as many Orthodox Christians do) that many Protestants are experiencing salvation here and now (and are therefore part of the Church here and now, since salvation comes through the Church), then it seems a natural extension of that to say that it is consistent with Orthodoxy to say that the Holy Spirit is guiding many Protestants towards right interpretation of Scripture. There are many reasons to accept the (1) of HSR, but I will wait to see if you disagree with (1) before I defend it. I suspect the primary disagreement will be with (2). Sure the Holy Spirit might be helping Joe Protestant interpret Scripture in some sense, but given that this help isn’t enough to keep Joe Protestant from error, nor enough to erase or prevent all of the important disagreements within Protestantism, can it be said that this help is enough to give Joe Protestant anything close to “reliability” when it comes to interpreting Scripture?

My argument for (2) assumes that Joe Protestant is part of the Church and is experiencing Salvation here and now. I think there are good reasons to believe that many Protestants are part of the Church, even if the Orthodox are right about the nature of the Church (and it is consistent with Orthodox belief to say this, so I’ve been led to believe). Again, I will wait to see if you object to Joe Protestant being part of the Church before I defend his soul.

Assuming that Joe Protestant is, then, part of the Church and experiencing salvation here and now, then, while he is in that salvation, it seems right to say that the Holy Spirit will strongly guide Joe away from beliefs which are detrimental towards salvation and the unity of the Church, and towards beliefs which are essential to salvation and the unity of the Church.

Practically speaking the content of these beliefs will come directly or indirectly from Scripture, so it seems that Joe has a reliable method for interpreting Scripture, at least in so far as those interpretations lead away from “detrimental” beliefs and towards “essential” beliefs.

Some notes:

First, by “strongly guide” I do not mean that it guarantees that Joe will have all of the “essential” beliefs and none of the “detrimental beliefs” at any given time, but it does guarantee that he will tend away from them, at least while he remains in Christ.

What about the disagreements? The “important disagreements argument” against the above idea must assume firstly that those important disagreements involve beliefs which are either “detrimental” or “essential,” but disagreements can be “important” without falling into the “super important” category. In your response to James, you say rightly that Protestants disagree over some pretty cosmic stuff. But I want to say that even those important disagreements pale in comparison to the real “core” beliefs, That God created the universe out of nothing, that God is good, that God is a Trinity, that Christ became man, died on the cross and was raised from the dead, that we ought to have faith in Christ, that he is coming again, etc. etc.There is substantial agreement about these and other things within Protestantism (along with Catholics and Orthodox). The unity to be found within Protestantism is obviously substantial. True, there are some who call themselves Christians who don’t agree with these doctrines, but that leads to the second assumption. The argument must also assume that if a Protestant wants to be inclusive about some (e.g. you’re a crazy Quaker but you’re still part of the Church and I’ll break bread with you) he has to be inclusive about everyone. But being inclusive about Quakers does not imply being inclusive about Mormons, why would it? Substantial unity within “Christianity” as a whole has to be gerrymandered, but that’s okay so long as you have reasons for your gerrymandering.

Whelp, I’ve said too much and not enough. I await your response in six months.

Warning: the following comment is a long-winded way of saying that the easy division between culture and theology is problematic. Now you don’t have to read it….

I won’t argue for or against “Protestantism” here because it seems to me that the label in the context of this sort of argument is really dubious. I assume everyone here would agree that a hefty list of counterexamples to the caricature of “individual authority,” for example, could be produced quite easily within the gates of “Protestantism.”

Now, as far as they go, these kinds of critiques are good. _Of course_ the idea of “letting Jesus into my heart” or “having a personal relationship with God” as the determinative reality of a Christian life is cheap garbage, but that doesn’t mean there aren’t plenty of resources in, say, the actual reformers (among other places) that can name it as such.

Of course, you might roll your eyes and say that this is just cop-out–hiding behind an easy “labels are bad” quip, and fair enough. I promise, though, that’s not all it is. Labels can be good if there are structural issues that outweigh the damage caused by ignoring their exceptions. A real problem I have with framing a debate in this way is that it gives you little to no resources to be able to adjudicate important cultural trends (ones that deserve labels!) that are both theologically significant and common to people across Protestant and Catholic lines.

An extremely simple example of this at work is American exceptionalism. One of the benefits of being north of the border is enjoying a different kind of “common sense” amongst conservative Christians–one that is not implicated in the problematic assumption that US foreign policy since WWII is basically just. Up here, it’s quite obvious to pretty much everyone that we should stop feeding the military industrial complex and killing innocent people abroad (that’s not to say that Canadians don’t have their own heretical national ideologies–just an example).

My point is that, given this way of looking at things, am I, as a Protestant, unable to critique someone like Michael Novak on orthodox theological grounds because I am not a Roman Catholic? At my church (Reformed), I can tell you from experience that this is exactly what would happen. One reason this would happen is that the problem would be framed in terms of social realities that are not “ecclesiological” in a proper sense, yet still profoundly theological.

Challenging posts! Thanks for provoking discussion on this crucial subject.

I notice persistent accusations of having a faulty understanding of SS. Have you considered writing a post where you establish a definition of SS through an interaction with primary (Calvin, Luther) and secondary sources? May help deter the accusations and bolster force of your argument.

Regarding secondary sources, I think you might find Keith Mathison’s The Shape of Sola Scriptura interesting. I’ve only skimmed it, though I think he would agree with much of what you’re saying. However, as some have accused, he would suggest that what you take issue with isn’t Sola Scriptura as understood by the Early Church and the Reformers, but a cancer Mathison dubs Solo Scriptura.

I think the Mathisoin presents a compelling argument that you might want to take a look at. If his view of SS is sound, we may find that the Reformers, and some Protestants denominations today, do hold views of authority and interpretation that are more ancient than modern. That is, their doctrine and hermeneutic do not succumb to many (if not all) of the problems you’ve outlined.

I apologize for being so slow to respond. Furthermore, I apologize for my meager input! I feel much of what is being discussed is found in deep, unfamiliar waters. The issues are very much philosophical in nature, a realm with which I’m not too acquainted, unfortunately.